A new study conducted by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) analyzed hospital stays over an eight-year period spanning 1997 to 2005. The results are significant, in that hospital stays for patients suffering from PPH / PAH are up 50 per cent over the eight years—from 301,400 in 1997 to 456,500 in 2005. Given that we are two full years beyond the close of the study and beginning the third year, it is reasonable to assume those numbers are higher still.
What's more, the average cost for hospitalization inherent with each PPH / PAH patient in the year 2005 was about 50 per cent higher than the bill for an average hospital stay: $12,400 against $8,100.
The findings were released New Years Day.
Pulmonary hypertension happens when there is a build up of resistance in arteries that carry blood to the lungs from the right side of the heart. While it appears mostly in patients suffering from heart failure, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and pneumonia, doctors fail to identify a cause in 1.5 per cent of the cases.Can it be speculated that the 1.5 per cent is the result of Fen-Phen and other weight-loss drugs, and appetite suppressants?
It could. The now-banned combination of fenfluramine and phentermine was found in a study published by the New England Journal of Medicine in 1996 to pose a risk of PPH—specifically a 23 per cent higher risk when taking Fen-Phen for three months or longer.
The US Food and Drug Administration recalled Fen-Phen, as well as Redux (dexfenfluramine) and Pondimin (fenfluramine) a year later, in 1997.
Perhaps by sheer con-incidence, 1997 is the year chosen as the entry point for the new study by the AHRQ, a study that found incidence rates of Pulmonary Hypertension increasing when viewed through hospital admissions.
Given that it can often take up to 10 years for PPH / PAH symptoms to emerge after taking appetite suppressants (or even stopping them), the rise in hospital admissions appears to mirror that trend.
Various lawsuits have been brought against a host of drug makers, alleging inadequate testing for weight loss drugs. As well, various health care professionals and diet centers may be facing litigation over their role(s) in prescribing these drugs either individually, or in combination (such as the Fen-Phen cocktail that was so popular, for so many years).
Given the continuing rise of obesity levels, and the fervor of overweight people to find a magic elixir that would help them drop the pounds, it's little wonder that the weight loss industry is so lucrative.
Before they were recalled, the banned products noted above were faithfully consumed by six, to seven million people.
And now, hospital stays are rising. The reason? Possibly, it is because of more effective, and accurate diagnosis. Perhaps, it is due to the aging population.
Or perhaps, it is all these people who took all this bad stuff in order to shed pounds for all that time, only now beginning to feel the effects on their hearts, and lungs.
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And fifty per cent of PPH / PAH patients who remain undiagnosed, will be dead, on average within three years, if left untreated.
Maybe we are getting older. Perhaps age, in combination with genetics and a sedentary lifestyle, is coming home to roost.
But it could also be, desperate for a solution to excess bulk, we sought help and found it in an approved pill.
A pill—that may have cost us our lungs and maybe our lives. As of December 14th, there were 205 patients on the waiting list for lung transplants.